MURFREESBORO — Who
is the ultimate master of the hammered dulcimer — a national champion from
Tennessee or a Fulbright scholar from China?
Without engaging in an actual competition, two of the
world’s best hammered dulcimer players will perform in concert at 7:30 p.m.
Friday, Jan. 27, in the Wright Music Building.
The event, which is presented by the MTSU Center for Chinese
Music and Culture, will feature Yuening Liu, a professor at the Central
Conservatory of Music in Beijing, and United States national dulcimer champion
David Mahler.
This event is free and open to the public. A printable
campus parking map is available at http://tinyurl.com/MTSUParkingMap.
A trapezoid-shaped stringed instrument, the American hammered
dulcimer is struck with spoon-shaped mallets. Traditionally, it is used in the
U.S. in folk music.
Mahler, a Nashville-based composer and instrumentalist,
holds the record for being the youngest musician ever to capture the Walnut
Valley National Hammered Dulcimer Championship in Winfield, Kansas. He won the
title in 2004 at the age of 14. He plays the instrument in traditional
Appalachian, European folk and classical styles, as well as with contemporary
folk-rock and pop bands.
“The neat thing about the dulcimer is that it kind of has a
clean slate,” Mahler wrote on his Facebook page. “There is minimal music
written on it, and everyone varies on which techniques are best. For me, that
means the sky is the limit. Anything is possible on this instrument, and I seek
to explore all the intricacies that God created it with.”
Liu has served as a visiting professor at universities in
the United States, Ukraine and the Czech Republic. She was enrolled by the
prestigious Fulbright Program as a research scholar in 2016. In 2008, she
founded Jasmine Ensemble, the first group in China to perform classic Chinese
and international musical works with the yangqin, or Chinese hammered dulcimer,
in an ensemble format.
“Don’t expect just pretty mountain music as they pound every
bit of music out of their strings,” said Mei Han, director of the MTSU Center
for Chinese Music and Culture.
Han will join Liu and Mahler on stage to play the zheng, an
instrument that has a long rectangular sound box with 21 strings on top. It is
known as an Asian long zither. Other performers who will join Liu and Mahler on
stage include hammered dulcimer artist Mi Xuanye and Dong Nan, who will play
the pipa, a four-stringed lute.
For more information, contact Han at 615-898-5118 or
mei.han@mtsu.edu.
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